245|Flower Lantern Riddle, Lantern Night

It’s a good night for the first year of the lunar calendar.

Sort of early spring, winter is not far away, the wind is still cold. Xie Ren carrying a large bag, slowly walking on the roadside, face slightly flushed by the wind.

Inside the bag is a large pile of messy things he just received, I do not know whether it is useful or not. Anyway, if it was useful or not, he could only rely on it for his livelihood in the future.

A little while later, he passed a stall on the street.

The stall is called “He Ji Snacks”, selling some snacks, seems to be the owner of a family of three sitting at a small table in the leaning, a slim, quite good-looking woman walking through the table busy, the owner shouted at her to stop busy to sit down and she did not listen to it, just said “right away”, the voice of a yellow warbler, the owner said “I’ll be right there”, and the owner said “I’ll be right there”. Her voice was like a yellow warbler. The rest of the tables were occupied by some customers, but it seemed that they were only here for the young girl, just sitting and chatting, and went home in a short while. After all, today was the New Year’s Day.

A small pot stood in front of the stall, and the white, round, steaming nest of tiny things rolling in it slowed him down.

Xie Renxin said, “The Lantern Festival.”

When he was a child, every time on the New Year’s Day, the Lord and Queen of Xianle would eat a meal of Lantern Festival with him. Xie Ren is a very picky eater, do not like the Lantern Festival, the famous chef made the best dots in the golden bowl and jade to give him up he did not like it, disliked the sweetness, ate itchy teeth, this filling does not eat, that stuffing does not eat, gulp two mouthfuls of the matter.

Later grew up a little, he ran to Tai Cang Mountain to practice, the Lantern Festival time back and forth, counting did not eat a few meals. Now that he thinks about it, he actually does not remember at all, Lantern Festival this kind of thing, what exactly is the flavor.

Xie Ren discreetly glanced around the stall for a few moments, then discreetly lowered the large, unsightly bag from his shoulders, and finally, discreetly stepped inside.

He removed his bucket hat and held it in his hand, “Boss, please have a bowl of Lanterns. Do you have any here?”

That boss is quite some years old, looked at him, before answering, that slim girl smiled and answered, “Yes, you come in and sit down first!” This got up and busied herself with preparations. Xie Ren sat down, but saw that the boss shook his head, felt strange, thinking that is not where on his body dirty people do not like, specially looked down to see the sleeves of the clothes, to make sure that it is not dirty, slightly reassured, asked: “What’s wrong?”

He thought to himself that if the boss didn’t like him bringing that bag in, he’d just put it outside. Instead, the boss gave him another look and shook his head, “Miserable. Really miserable.”

Xie Ren said, “Ah? What did you say?”

The boss said, “It’s too miserable for a person to be freezing in the cold outside at a stall on the big Lantern Festival to eat Lanterns.”

“……” Xie Ren said, “You can’t be like this. Still do not do business ……”

The boss didn’t talk to him and went to take the bowl. After sitting for a while, Xie Ren felt that someone around him was sizing him up. Or rather, sizing him up and the unusually abrupt large bag next to him.

The boss’s daughter also sneaked over, squatted on the floor and poked the bag with her finger, seemingly curious about what was bulging inside, and was called out by her mother several times before going back. Xie Ren at this time has not yet cultivated the kind of thick skin that will be invulnerable to swords and spears in the future, can not help but use his foot to kick the big bag under the table, wanting to stuff it into a place where the others can not see. Unfortunately, the stall was small, and so were the tables, chairs and benches, so it was impossible to hide anything. Xie Ren had no choice but to keep coughing lightly, trying his best to ignore the gazes of the bystanders.

You’ll get used to it. It’s no big deal.

Suddenly, he remembered something, and hurriedly put his hand into his chest and pulled out, his face suddenly changed, and he thought, “This is even worse! Not only the big Lantern Festival of a person freezing in the cold outside the stall to eat Lantern, the money is still not enough!!!”

Originally he wanted to hurry and slip away, but at this time, the boss came over with a large porcelain bowl, put it on the table, and said, “Five dollars.”

“……”

Xie Ren felt slightly suffocated and said, “Uh …… I ……”

He coughed several times, his fist against the front of his mouth, and heard the owner say, “Isn’t that a no?”

Xie Ren was about to stand up and roll away when he saw a large porcelain bowl “bang” on the table in front of him.

When he froze, he heard the boss say, ”Forget it, seeing as you’re so miserable, I’ll give you a bowl. I’m going to close the stall when I’m done eating, so hurry back. Today is the Lantern Festival, it’s only right to be reunited!”

“……”

Xie Ren sat back down again, and although his mind was saying that there was actually no place he could go back to after finishing this bowl of Yuanxiao, he still whispered, “Thank you.”

That boss put down the bowl and went back. The small pot of leftover Lantern Festival snacks in front of the stall was brought to the small table by him. That little girl tilted her head and bit the spoon, “When is brother coming back? I want to eat it when he comes back.”

The boss also said, “It’s too late, it’s uncharacteristic to come back so late for the Lantern Festival!”

The woman said: “He is also hard, soon back, later you do not scold him. Miao-er, Miao-er don’t be busy anymore, always letting you come over to help, really too much, come over and eat together.”

That wonderful girl said, “It’s not busy!” Finally clearing a table, she also went over to sit down and share the Lanterns with them.

The four seemed to be waiting for another person in the family to come back for a reunion, talking and laughing. Xie Ren looked at them and picked up her own bowl, spooning one into her mouth and taking a sip of the sweet soup.

But still, I don’t know what it’s like.

–

“Brother, brother?”

Only then did Xie Ren come back to his senses, Hua Cheng was gazing at him from the side. The red clothes set off Hua Cheng’s eyebrows more and more brightly, and the lamplight gilded his fair to lifeless face with a layer of soft color. Xie Ren looked slightly dazed and said, “What?”

Hua Cheng said, “Is brother tired? Or can’t walk anymore?”

Xie Ren nodded casually as Hua Cheng said, “I’m sorry. I was the one who went overboard last night.”

After a while, Xie Ren reacted to what he meant by what he said and hastily waved her hand, “…… What are you talking about, it’s not that kind of thing at all! It doesn’t matter at all!”

Hanagi raised one eyebrow and said, “Really? If that’s perfectly fine, it means that I wasn’t too much yesterday? So I can ……?”

“……”

Xie Ren suddenly remembered, here is still in the ghost market street it, awakened a sweep, sure enough, I do not know when, in all directions crowded with a whole bunch of crooked melon cracked date strange contraptions, ears long vertical ears, ears short stretching the neck, almost everyone put the eyes open to copper bells big, staring at them in the dead, was shocked to do not know what to say. Finally, said, “Sanlang ah!”

Flower City smiled faintly and crossed his arms, “Alright, alright. My bad, let’s not talk about it.”

Xie Ren had also retracted his gaze from the street-side Lantern Demon Stalls long ago. On both sides of the street in the ghost market, red lanterns were hung all over, with riddles written all over them, and the ghosts yelled, “Guess the lantern riddle! Guess the lantern riddle! There are prizes for winning! Heavy prizes!!!”

Hua Cheng said to Xie Ren, “Brother, try it? There’s a prize.”

Xie Ren walked up and said, “Try?”

The ghosts all got excited and pushed each other, “Shhh! Hush! Big Uncle Gong is going to guess the riddle! Big Uncle Gong is going to guess the lantern riddle!!!”

“…… “This spread out, shouting as if he was going to jump to the gods, Xie Ren crowed and laughed, and was about to pick one at random, but immediately there was a tentacle that reached out from nowhere attentively sent a lantern, saying: “Please! Please!”

To Xie Ren, either one was the same. So he took the lamp and looked at it. The riddle was four words, “Find the white head.”

Without even thinking, Xie Ren said, “‘I’.”

Hua Cheng clapped his hands and praised, “Brother, awesome.” The ghosts also applauded with him, the ghosts cried and wailed, and there were also dark unknown objects that flipped in the air to applaud, which was not too pompous. Xie Ren sweated and said, “Actually, this …… is really simple.”

The tentacle sent over a second lamp and said, “You please! Please!”

Xie Ren took the lamp, and this time, the riddle was “The first day of Spring Festival.”

Again, without even thinking, Xie Ren spoke the answer, saying, “‘Husband’.”

Hua Cheng was about to raise his hand to stroke his palm again when Xie Ren said, “No need, this is also very simple.”

Hua Cheng smiled and said, “Is that so? But, I genuinely think that my brother is awesome.”

Xie Renxin said, “Where where. It’d be awesome if you personally inscribed riddles on the lanterns and I still solved them ……”

At this point, the tentacles delivered a third lamp, singing, “After you! After you!”

Xie Ren took a look at the result and frowned slightly. The surrounding area also said, “Wow! This time’s hard!”

Xie Ren nodded. Sure enough, this time the riddle could not be seen through at a glance: “Shyly bowing her head to show her devotion.”

However, it wasn’t too difficult. A short while later, Xie Ren said, “‘Shy’ means mimosa, take the grass part; low, take the head of the word low; ‘table pouring heart’, take the center of the ‘pouring’ word The center of the character ‘倾’ is taken for ‘表倾心’. The three parts together are …… ‘flower’. The riddle is flower.”

When he finished speaking, he covered his ears. Sure enough, as soon as he reported the answer to the riddle, the group of devils began to dance around again, blabbering without any bottom line, so pompous that it was numbing. Hua Cheng looked at him with a smile and said, “Brother, this time, it’s truly awesome.”

The tentacle quietly probed over again with the lamp raised, and Xie Ren smiled and said, “There’s something even better. This time, I’ll be able to guess the answer to the riddle without looking at the riddle, believe it or not.”

Hua Cheng’s eyes widened as he said, “Oh really, brother actually has this stunt?”

Xie Ren took the lamp and said, “Of course, I guess, this time the riddle is ‘City’. The city of flowers, right?”

Lift the lamp to see, sure enough, “dry go a move south fixed”. Xie Ren said, “Dry Go moves, inverted Go, inverted for ‘earth’; ‘Go’ retained; ‘South set’, take ‘square ‘ character south, set in the center of ‘earth’ and ‘go’ as ‘city’. This should be one of the most difficult mysteries to solve, unfortunately ……”

Unfortunately, he guessed the pattern first. What are the four riddles in a row?

The ghosts were recognized, they did not dare to cheer, instead they coughed and looked at the sky. Hua Cheng’s gaze slowly swept over, all the ghosts were scared out of their wits in general, some drilled into the lamps, some drilled into the ground, and they all hugged their heads and said, “Lord City rest your anger!!!! It wasn’t my idea!!!” “It wasn’t me either!” “No shit! You obviously agreed the loudest!!!”

Hua Cheng said in a faint voice, “Get lost.”

All of a sudden, the ghosts of everyone on this street were instantly like windswept clouds, with very few left. Xie Ren hung the lamp back on the shelf and guffawed, “Go back.”

The two of them walked side by side as they walked together towards the Thousand Lights Guan. On the way, Hua Cheng said in a serious manner, “Brother, don’t look at me in that way. It really wasn’t me who told them to do that.”

Xie Ren smiled and said, “I know. Your words will definitely not set up a riddle like that.”

Hua Cheng said, “Oh? Then what does brother think, how would I set up the riddle?”

Xie Ren said unguardedly, “Of course, ‘my husband Sanlang’ ……”

At this point, he realized that “trouble comes out of the mouth”, and quickly stopped his mouth. However, it was already too late. Hua Cheng laughed out loud and said, “Brother, you fell for it! Beautiful!”

“…… cunning, cunning ……”

At that exact moment, the two of them returned to the Thousand Lanterns Guan. Upon entering the main hall, Xie Ren realized that on top of the jade platform, there was actually a table set up. He was stunned and went up to see that it was actually two bowls of Lanterns.

He turned back, and Flower City came up as well, saying, “This is what brother was looking at on the road just now, isn’t it?”

Xie Ren nodded.

Flower City said, “Sit down and eat together, brother.”

“……”

Xie Ren, however, did not sit down, but suddenly ran headlong into his arms, burying her face in his chest and wrapping her arms around Hua Cheng, not letting go.

Hanagi backhanded him in a hug as well.

After an unknown number of years, he finally remembered, again, what the Lantern Festival was like.